1. Technical Field
The present disclosure relates generally to a portable electronic device, and more particularly to a connection device for connecting an electronic component such as a vibration motor, a speaker phone, a dome sheet, or a microphone to a main circuit board of the electronic device.
2. Description of the Related Art
Portable electronic devices (herein, “portable terminals,” interchangeably) such as smart phones, tablet computers, portable cameras, radios, e-book readers and the like include various circuit devices for conducting, e.g., communication and multimedia functions; and other electronic components, e.g., various input/output (I/O) devices for providing a user interface (UI). Examples of input devices include a microphone for inputting sound, a keypad for inputting characters or data, a touchscreen for inputting data and commands, and a camera; example output devices include a speaker, a display device and a flash. In addition, some products may be provided with a vibration motor for several functions, for example, call reception and schedule notification.
A portable terminal usually includes a central processing device, a storage device, a communication module and the like which are mounted on a main circuit board (hereafter also referred to as a printed circuit board (PCB)). I/O devices are disposed inside of a housing of the portable terminal separately from the PCB. Accordingly, each of the electronic components is connected to the PCB through a connecting device in the portable terminal Now, an electronic component involved with image data, such as a display device or a camera is preferably connected to the PCB through a flexible printed circuit board (“flex board”) including a plurality of data lines, due to the large amount of data required in typical applications. Other I/O devices, however, such as a speaker phone, a microphone, and a vibration motor, may sufficiently perform I/O signal transfer merely using a 2-pin or 3-pin data line. Accordingly, some electronic components are usually connected to the PCB through a connecting device using conducting wires.
FIGS. 1 to 3 illustrate different ways of connecting an electronic component, 10, to a main circuit board only using a 2-pin data line. The electronic component 10 is exemplified as a vibrator motor. In FIGS. 1 and 2, the electronic component 10 is connectable to the PCB through a 2-pin data line formed by a pair of conducting wires 11. In FIG. 3, connection is made through a flex board 15 in which a 2-pin data line is implemented by a printed circuit. In the examples, the conducting wires 11 and the flex board 15 are connected to the electronic components 10 at one end and extend by a predetermined length. The lengths and shapes of the conducting wires 11 and the flex board 15 may be suitably designed according to an allotted space where the electronic component 10 is installed.
In FIG. 1, the insulating sheath of each conducting wire 11 connected to the electronic component 10 is removed at the end of the conducting wire 11 to expose the conductive core of the wire 11. The exposed core is attachable by soldering to a soldering pad (not shown) provided on the PCB to make electrical connection thereto. A shortcoming of this soldering technique, however, is that the soldering pad is added to the main circuit board, and a soldering process is separately performed, thereby adding manufacturing processes and degrading productivity. In particular, a PCB for a portable terminal where various high density integrated circuits (ICs) and the like are disposed is usually fabricated through a surface mount process. Hence soldering a conducting wire to the PCB inevitably adds a process, which increases manufacturing costs. In addition, when a conducting wire is connected to the PCB through soldering, the electronic component 10 itself such as a vibration motor should also be fixed on the PCB. The component 10 thus occupies space on the PCB, detrimentally leaving less space for an IC in a circuit layout design of the PCB.
In FIG. 2, the conducting wires 11 connected to the electronic component 10 are provided with a separate connector 13. The connector 13 is engaged with a counterpart connector, for example, a socket provided on the PCB to connect the conducting wire 11/component 10 to the PCB. Thus the component 10 can be mounted away from the PCB, thereby freeing up space for other circuitry. When the connector 13 is installed at the end of the conducting wire 11, the connector 13 may be engaged with the socket of the main board in the course of assembling the electronic component 10 to an inner surface of the portable terminal housing and assembling the PCB in the housing. However, since the unit price of such a connector is high and the installation of a corresponding socket is required, the manufacturing cost rises. A further problem is that the connection of the connector to the socket is manually performed, which reduces productivity.
FIG. 3 illustrates component 10 connected to the flex board 15, in which data pins connected with data lines 16 at the end of the flex board 15 are exposed. The end of the flex board is coupled to a connector such as the socket separately provided on the PCB to connect the data pins to the PCB. Although the flex board is flexible, it is difficult to deform it as freely as the conducting wires 11 illustrated in FIGS. 1 and 2. Accordingly, when the design of the inner space of the portable terminal is changed, the flex board that connects the electronic component to the main circuit board often needs to be redesigned, making it difficult to standardize the flex board and/or make it commonly usable. Also, as compared to a conventional conducting wire, the manufacturing cost of the flex board itself is high, resulting in higher unit costs.